Described as “a beat poet of the upper latitudes”, Jen Hadfield is the author of three collections. Her second, Nigh-No-Place (Bloodaxe, 2008), won the TS Eliot Prize and was shortlisted for the Forward Prize. She was recently named the 2014 Dr Gavin Wallace Fellow. For more information, you can check out her blog.

BETTER THAN NEEPS: NIALL CAMPBELL

Niall Campbell is originally from the Western Isles of Scotland. His first collection, Moontide (Bloodaxe, 2014), won the Saltire First Book of the Year Award in 2014. It was also shortlisted for the Aldeburgh and Forward Prizes for Best First Collection. Last year he was named inaugural winner of the Edwin Morgan Poetry Award. You can also read his blog.

Sileagh MacWhirter and Jim Bowers deliver spine tingling vocals and outstanding guitar arrangements of original acoustic songs and favourites from artists such as John Martyn, Bert Jansch and Carole King.

Of course, you’ll have a chance to support Shore Poets and win the amazing lemon cake by participating in our raffle. Often, the raffle includes other prizes donated by our readers or Shore Poets. So even if you don’t win the lemon cake, you could walk away with a prize!

We had great fun at our October event, and the November event (Sunday 30 November – mark your diaries!) is going to be a cracker – we are, as I believe the young people say, Mixing It Up A Bit. But the Shore Poets are not resting on any proverbial laurels, for this month we also have two pamphlet launches and a prize nomination!

Ian and Tracey (and their respective publishers, and the Scottish Poetry Library, and the gods of Poetry) would be thrilled if you could attend.

Also! Christine De Luca’s pamphlet Dat Trickster Sun [Mariscat Press] has been shortlisted for the Michael Marks Awards. The winner will be announced at a special dinner (!) at the British Library on 25 November. I’m guessing this isn’t open to the general public, sadly. We are all hoping that Christine will win and no one will spill any of their special dinner on the books, as I believe the British Library librarians get cross about that sort of thing.

Our November headline poet, Gerrie Fellows, was born in New Zealand, lives in Glasgow, and works as a creative writing tutor. Her first collection, Technologies and other poems, was published by Polygon in 1990, and ten years later they also published The Powerlines, a collection that traces Scottish and New Zealand connections through a variety of women’s voices. The Duntroon Toponymy was published by Mariscat in 2001, and Window for a Small Blue Child by Carcanet in 2007. You can read some of Gerrie’s poem at the Scottish Poetry Library website.

The Shore Poet for November is Christine de Luca. Christine has published five collections of poetry in English and Shetlandic. The Shetland Library brought out the first three: Voes & Sounds (1994), Wast Wi Da Valkyries (1997), and Plain Song (2002). The first two of these won the Shetland Literary Prize. Luath Press published Parallel Worlds in 2005 and North End of Eden in 2010. A bilingual Selected, Mondes Parallèles, (éditions fédérop, 2007) won the poetry Prix du Livre Insulaire. Christine’s first novel, And Then Forever, was published in 2011. Find out more at christinedeluca.co.uk

Our new poet for November is Tracey S. Rosenberg. Tracey is from America, and lives permanently in Scotland with her husband and cat. She’s the author of the historical novel The Girl in the Bunker (Cargo Publishing, 2011) and a poetry pamphlet, Lipstick is Always a Plus (Stewed Rhubarb Press, 2012). Her work has appeared in a variety of places, including New Writing Scotland, Gutter Magazine, and the Journal of the American Medical Association, and she’s performed her poetry at many slams and festivals. She is currently working on a new collection, and a variety of jigsaw puzzles. Tracey blogs at tsrosenberg.wordpress.com

There’ll also be chance for YOU to read your work as part of this stellar line up! Just bring a poem, put your name in the hat at the door when you arrive, and you may be picked for one of our TWO three-minute wildcard slots!

We’ll also have live music from Andy Miller, and of course, our lemon cake raffle!

Thanks to everyone who came along to the last night of our 2012-13 season! We thoroughly enjoyed all the readings and felt like we went out with a bang this year! We’ll be back on 29th September 2013 with a brand new season programme, packed with exciting poets and musicians. In the meantime, you can stay in touch via Twitter, and you can also peruse these photos of the June event!

Tracey S Rosenberg took the final Shore Poets Wildcard slot of the season! We loved her poem about Doctor Who companions.

A good friend of Shore Poets, Tom Fairnie played us songs about “woman, the creator and destroyer,” among other things!

Samuel Tongue was the first of the Clydebuilters to take the mic. Among his poems was a brilliant piece of ekphrasis.

Eveline Pye, also representing Clydebuilters, began a poem with the great lines, “In the dream I know he’s dead / but I also know he’s going to be hungry.”

Nuala Watt, the third Clyebuilter to come to the mic, impressed us with her feisty comebacks in response to Milton and others.

The final Clydebuilter of the night was Irene Hossack, whose poem for the Red Road asylum seekers was really moving.

Our Shore Poet was the always excellent Nancy Somerville, who delighted everyone by bringing out the old favourite “A Bucket of Frogs.” Many thanks to Alan Coady for the second of these two photos of Nancy.

Our headliner was the inimitable Don Paterson, who read some fantastic new work, including a found poem full of bizarre things people have written about him on the internet.